Halifax hotdog vendor to be selling again Monday as police probe tweets

Halifax Regional Police are looking into tweets posted by Jerry Reddick, also known as the Dawgfather. (TED PRITCHARD / Staff / File)

A well-known Halifax hotdog vendor was not at his usual post outside the Dalhousie Student Union building Wednesday, a day after police received a complaint about alleged anti-Semitic comments he made on social media.

Jerry Reddick, also known as the Dawgfather, took to Twitter on Tuesday and posted several comments, some referring to Jews and the Holocaust, including a reference to ovens, as well as the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.

Reddick said he made the comments to prove a point about the different standards applied to freedom of expression, a hot topic that has been under intense debate around the world since last week’s mass shooting at the Paris satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

In a brief conversation Wednesday, Reddick promised he would be back selling hotdogs at Dalhousie on Monday and that he had been away for a little while to work on other things.

He declined to comment on the social media postings, citing prior commitments.

“We received a complaint (Tuesday) about anti-Semitic posts online. The investigation has been assigned to the general investigation section, and there has been no charges or arrests.”

Wayne MacKay, a Dalhousie law professor, said police are likely looking at whether Reddick contravened a section of the Criminal Code that deals with “the wilful promotion of hatred that’s not in a private conversation against an identifiable group.”

As such, MacKay said that in Canada free speech is “an important and basic value,” but there are certain lines that can’t be crossed.

“We’re much more accepting that there are some limits on free speech in Canada,” he said.

“I think the important line that has to be drawn in Canada and most other (countries), is it’s one thing to say (something is) offensive — and maybe it is, and certainly offensive to some, I have no doubt about that — but it has to be more than just offensive, it does have to be a wilful — so intentional — promotion of hatred against an identifiable group.

“That’s a pretty high standard to meet in order for it to be criminal.”

Section 1 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, sometimes referred to as the reasonable limits clause, states that it “guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”

That is the distinction as to how free speech is viewed and enforced in the United States, for example.

“In the United States, by contrast, the First Amendment guarantees free speech, but they don’t have any section putting limits on it,” MacKay said. “Now, by judges’ decisions, they do put some limits, but in the constitution itself in the U.S., they don’t have a limiting section like our Section 1.”

In it, Benlolo said that Reddick’s comments are “offensive and blatantly anti-Semitic.”

“As a Canadian human rights organization, we are disheartened by this vicious anti-Semitic attack, which has capacity to inspire and motivate others to project hatred against the Jewish community and society at large,” Benlolo said.